Page 25 - HaMizrachi Sukkot 5783 USA

The power of Sukkot is that it takes us back to the most ele-
mental roots of our being. You don’t need to live in a palace
to be surrounded by Clouds of Glory. You don’t need to be
gloriously wealthy to buy yourself the same leaves and fruit
that a billionaire uses in worshiping G-d. Living in the sukkah
and inviting guests to your meal, you discover that the people
who have come to visit you are none other than Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob and their wives (such is the premise of ush-
pizin, the mystical guests). What makes a hut more beautiful
than a home is that when it comes to Sukkot there is no
difference between the richest of the rich and the poorest of
the poor. We are all strangers on earth, temporary residents
in G-d’s almost eternal universe. And whether or not we are
capable of pleasure, whether or not we have found happiness,
nonetheless we can all feel joy.
Sukkot is the time we ask the most profound question of what
makes a life worth living. Having prayed on Rosh Hashanah
and Yom Kippur to be written in the Book of Life, Kohelet (PHOTO: BLAKE EZRA / THE RABBI SACKS LEGACY)
forces us to remember how brief life actually is, and how
vulnerable. “Teach us to number our days that we may get a tomorrow. Security is not something we can achieve physi-
heart of wisdom.” What matters is not how long we live, but cally but it is something we can acquire mentally, psycholog-
how intensely we feel that life is a gift we repay by giving to ically, spiritually. All it needs is the courage and willingness
others. Joy, the overwhelming theme of the festival, is what to sit under the shadow of G-d’s sheltering wings.
we feel when we know that it is a privilege simply to be alive, Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks zt"l was an international
inhaling the intoxicating beauty of this moment amidst the religious leader, philosopher, award-winning author, and
profusion of nature, the teeming diversity of life and the respected moral voice. Following his untimely passing,
sense of communion with those many others who share our The Rabbi Sacks Legacy was established to perpetuate
history and our hope. the timeless and universal wisdom of Rabbi Sacks as a
teacher of Torah, a moral voice, and a leader of leaders.
Most majestically of all, Sukkot is the festival of insecurity. It www.rabbisacks.org
is the candid acknowledgement that there is no life without
risk, yet we can face the future without fear when we know
we are not alone. G-d is with us, in the rain that brings bless-
ings to the earth, in the love that brought the universe and
us into being, and in the resilience of spirit that allowed a
small and vulnerable people to outlive the greatest empires
the world has ever known. Sukkot reminds us that G-d’s
glory was present in the small, portable Tabernacle Moses
and the Israelites built in the desert even more emphatically
than in Solomon’s Temple with all its grandeur. A Temple
can be destroyed. But a sukkah, even if broken, can be rebuilt

| 25